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I wanted to let you know of something that some people don’t know about yet but soon will. You have heard of Trans fats (partially hydrogenated oils) well meet its cousin. It’s called Interesterified fat (Fully hydrogenated oils). One of the first thing I start noticing it in is peanut butter and Jiff is using it now. The bad thing is they don’t have to list it as a FAT content on the ingredients label yet, as they are not required to at this time. Interesterified fats are just as bad as Trans fats. Interesterified fat is the food industries replacement and trickery for Trans fats in foods with the bad health effects and maybe worse than trans fats. An article in the journal Nutrition & Metabolism entitled interesterified fat and trans-rich fat raise the LDL/HDL ratio and plasma and both interesterified fat and trans were found to raise LDL and lower HDL cholesterol. Scientists have found a brand new way to raise your bad fat, lower your good fat and give you a greater chance of having a heart attack or stroke.

In order to remove dangerous trans fats from margarine, a process is used called interesterification is now used. Since learning of this process I’ve done a little research to find out how this works and if these new fats are likely to cause any health problems.

So here is how interesterification works. Take an oil molecule, called a triglyceride. The structure of a triglyceride is 3 long fatty acid strands (hence tri) joined at one end by a glycerol backbone. Chemicals are used to snip the fatty acid strands off the backbone. They are then mixed with chemically saturated oils (fully hydrogenated oil) and reattached to the backbone in groups of three in an order that simply does not occur in nature. True – there are no trans fats, the nasties linked to heart disease. Instead we have a new type of chemically constructed fat. Studies have been done on this new fat and the evidence is mixed. Some studies show it does not cause an increase in cholesterol like trans fats. However others studies show this new interesterified fat increased blood sugar by 20% in just one month, and greatly increased insulin resistance. It also decreased HDL and increased LDL like trans fats do. This is not good for those of you who may be prone to diabetes, heart disease or weight gain. It will only increase your problems. Barry Sears says “I consider this type of new trans-fat free fat to be far more dangerous than standard trans-fat derivatives.”

So my recommendation is – because they are so unnatural and not proven safe – AVOID MARGARINES!